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You can find the current article at its original source at https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/jul/24/theresa-may-brexit-no-deal-panic-stockpiling-food-civil-unrest
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| Version 1 | Version 2 |
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| Take fright on Brexit: even the civil service head is telling us to panic | Take fright on Brexit: even the civil service head is telling us to panic |
| (25 days later) | |
| Has any government earned a worse end-of-term report? As they depart today, Theresa May’s shambolic crew leaves Westminster sinking in the debris of their serial disasters. Department after department confronts failures that would all make daily headlines, were they not hidden by looming Brexit Armageddon. | Has any government earned a worse end-of-term report? As they depart today, Theresa May’s shambolic crew leaves Westminster sinking in the debris of their serial disasters. Department after department confronts failures that would all make daily headlines, were they not hidden by looming Brexit Armageddon. |
| Why the Amazon boss’s warning of no-deal Brexit unrest rings hollow | Ellie Mae O’Hagan | Why the Amazon boss’s warning of no-deal Brexit unrest rings hollow | Ellie Mae O’Hagan |
| Shameful conduct by the chief whip and the party chairman has left a stink of disgrace at May’s failure to sack them over the “pairing” scandal following last week’s knife-edge vote. A paltry rap-on-the-knuckles fine from the puny Electoral Commission after Vote Leave broke referendum spending rules leaves a taint on all future elections: why not cheat when penalties are nugatory? A new low standard has been set. | Shameful conduct by the chief whip and the party chairman has left a stink of disgrace at May’s failure to sack them over the “pairing” scandal following last week’s knife-edge vote. A paltry rap-on-the-knuckles fine from the puny Electoral Commission after Vote Leave broke referendum spending rules leaves a taint on all future elections: why not cheat when penalties are nugatory? A new low standard has been set. |
| The people of Gateshead may not have greeted the cabinet’s patronising awayday visit yesterday with good grace: every graph shows the north-east hardest hit by all cabinet decisions since 2010. Jockeying for the near-vacant top seat, this fractious cabinet displays more vanity than seriousness in its ever-moving portfolios. | The people of Gateshead may not have greeted the cabinet’s patronising awayday visit yesterday with good grace: every graph shows the north-east hardest hit by all cabinet decisions since 2010. Jockeying for the near-vacant top seat, this fractious cabinet displays more vanity than seriousness in its ever-moving portfolios. |
| Consider what the end-of-term audit would be for each minister. Esther McVey at the Department for Work and Pensions rolls out more universal credit chaos, as poverty rises. Chris Grayling has cut a disaster trail through every department he’s worked in – first the work programme fiasco, then prisons, courts, legal aid and probation ruination – and now rail mayhem. | Consider what the end-of-term audit would be for each minister. Esther McVey at the Department for Work and Pensions rolls out more universal credit chaos, as poverty rises. Chris Grayling has cut a disaster trail through every department he’s worked in – first the work programme fiasco, then prisons, courts, legal aid and probation ruination – and now rail mayhem. |
| McVey rolls out more universal credit chaos. Grayling brings rail mayhem. And Javid approves capital punishment | McVey rolls out more universal credit chaos. Grayling brings rail mayhem. And Javid approves capital punishment |
| At health, new boy Matt Hancock picks up the underfunding fallout, not resolved by next year’s bung, with social care a yawning gap. In education, the legacy left by Michael Gove has created scores of failed free schools and academies, and a brutal curriculum driving children to worsening anxiety levels. At the Home Office, violent crime rises, police numbers shrink, and Windrush reveals a broken immigration system – as the leadership hopeful Sajid Javid gives the green light to capital punishment. | At health, new boy Matt Hancock picks up the underfunding fallout, not resolved by next year’s bung, with social care a yawning gap. In education, the legacy left by Michael Gove has created scores of failed free schools and academies, and a brutal curriculum driving children to worsening anxiety levels. At the Home Office, violent crime rises, police numbers shrink, and Windrush reveals a broken immigration system – as the leadership hopeful Sajid Javid gives the green light to capital punishment. |
| Eight years of austerity has only cut debt by shifting a financial deficit on to a social deficit everywhere else. Philip Hammond, the chancellor and austerian-in-chief, has said taxes must rise to pay for the NHS, but he will return to his autumn budget besieged by needs in every threadbare service. Austerity was not accompanied by telling the public to expect less of everything for ever. | Eight years of austerity has only cut debt by shifting a financial deficit on to a social deficit everywhere else. Philip Hammond, the chancellor and austerian-in-chief, has said taxes must rise to pay for the NHS, but he will return to his autumn budget besieged by needs in every threadbare service. Austerity was not accompanied by telling the public to expect less of everything for ever. |
| The newly assertive Tory right threatens to block any tax rises. Yesterday the Taxpayers’ Alliance (its backers opaque) warned in the Daily Mail that tax is already too high – a shot across Treasury bows. Without a new election, paralysis blocks this government. | The newly assertive Tory right threatens to block any tax rises. Yesterday the Taxpayers’ Alliance (its backers opaque) warned in the Daily Mail that tax is already too high – a shot across Treasury bows. Without a new election, paralysis blocks this government. |
| For now, the Brexit crisis distracts from all its other failures. When the former attorney general Dominic Grieve tells Sky News that no deal will cast us into “a state of emergency – basic services we take for granted might not be available”, Cassandra-like, he is ignored as Project Fear mark two. But when Doug Gurr, the head of Amazon UK – no political player – warns of “civil unrest” within two weeks of a no-deal guillotine, we should all sit up and pay attention. He said that to Dominic Raab, the Brexit secretary, at a meeting with business chiefs last Friday: Amazon is making contingency plans. | For now, the Brexit crisis distracts from all its other failures. When the former attorney general Dominic Grieve tells Sky News that no deal will cast us into “a state of emergency – basic services we take for granted might not be available”, Cassandra-like, he is ignored as Project Fear mark two. But when Doug Gurr, the head of Amazon UK – no political player – warns of “civil unrest” within two weeks of a no-deal guillotine, we should all sit up and pay attention. He said that to Dominic Raab, the Brexit secretary, at a meeting with business chiefs last Friday: Amazon is making contingency plans. |
| Everyone will take fright at the government’s own warnings to businesses and households. John Manzoni, the head of the civil service, told MPs last week that a no-deal break would be “almost unimaginable”, and have “horrendous consequences”. Already the government warns that the M26 in Kent will be a “holding area” for 1,400 trucks to ease gridlock as 10,000 lorries a day are potentially delayed by new EU customs checks. Mazoni warns of the need to stockpile food and medicines: “We have to put contingencies in place.” Stockpiling food – that’s an order to panic! And why not – half our food is imported, of which 80% comes from Europe via Dover. | Everyone will take fright at the government’s own warnings to businesses and households. John Manzoni, the head of the civil service, told MPs last week that a no-deal break would be “almost unimaginable”, and have “horrendous consequences”. Already the government warns that the M26 in Kent will be a “holding area” for 1,400 trucks to ease gridlock as 10,000 lorries a day are potentially delayed by new EU customs checks. Mazoni warns of the need to stockpile food and medicines: “We have to put contingencies in place.” Stockpiling food – that’s an order to panic! And why not – half our food is imported, of which 80% comes from Europe via Dover. |
| May sends cabinet on mini-breaks to Europe to sell her Brexit deal | May sends cabinet on mini-breaks to Europe to sell her Brexit deal |
| Every week new official warnings – on aviation, driving licences, nuclear safety – will cause new red tape (oh, the irony!). The City was warned yesterday that the EU rejects its “equivalence” plan to keep selling financial services to Europe. That risks gaping holes in Treasury revenues. But the purpose of these no-deal preparations is to satisfy supporters of Jacob Rees-Mogg that their preferred no deal is an option – and to convince the EU that we could walk away. But it will frighten most of us to see what no-deal really means. The EU has issued its own warnings, especially to the 5 million EU and UK expat citizens. | Every week new official warnings – on aviation, driving licences, nuclear safety – will cause new red tape (oh, the irony!). The City was warned yesterday that the EU rejects its “equivalence” plan to keep selling financial services to Europe. That risks gaping holes in Treasury revenues. But the purpose of these no-deal preparations is to satisfy supporters of Jacob Rees-Mogg that their preferred no deal is an option – and to convince the EU that we could walk away. But it will frighten most of us to see what no-deal really means. The EU has issued its own warnings, especially to the 5 million EU and UK expat citizens. |
| When the Moggites talk glibly of happily existing on World Trade Organisation terms, they omit the 10% tariffs on UK-made cars and 50% or more on dairy products. Oddly, Raab claims that the EU’s no-deal preparations are “irresponsible” – unlike our own. You can only hope to God this is a phoney war – but as the historian Margaret Macmillan pointed out in her Reith lectures, in the runup to wars and trade wars, leaders misstep, and disasters happen. | When the Moggites talk glibly of happily existing on World Trade Organisation terms, they omit the 10% tariffs on UK-made cars and 50% or more on dairy products. Oddly, Raab claims that the EU’s no-deal preparations are “irresponsible” – unlike our own. You can only hope to God this is a phoney war – but as the historian Margaret Macmillan pointed out in her Reith lectures, in the runup to wars and trade wars, leaders misstep, and disasters happen. |
| Off they go now on their summer grand tour of all 27 EU capitals, May and her new foreign secretary, Jeremy Hunt, trying to bribe some countries away from the Barnier line. But so far that ploy has met a remarkable wall of solidarity. When they return, they will be just a month from the critical European council meeting to agree the withdrawal deal – or not. This parliamentary impasse will have shifted not one iota. | Off they go now on their summer grand tour of all 27 EU capitals, May and her new foreign secretary, Jeremy Hunt, trying to bribe some countries away from the Barnier line. But so far that ploy has met a remarkable wall of solidarity. When they return, they will be just a month from the critical European council meeting to agree the withdrawal deal – or not. This parliamentary impasse will have shifted not one iota. |
| Conspiracy theorists claim a “deep state” really controls this country, a civil service and a dark establishment that prevent any radical change. That theory is now being tested to destruction. This has been the worst session of parliament in recent memory: the next may be worse. There is no deep state – nothing out there to save us from self-inflicted disaster. Only we can save us from ourselves. | Conspiracy theorists claim a “deep state” really controls this country, a civil service and a dark establishment that prevent any radical change. That theory is now being tested to destruction. This has been the worst session of parliament in recent memory: the next may be worse. There is no deep state – nothing out there to save us from self-inflicted disaster. Only we can save us from ourselves. |
| • Polly Toynbee is a Guardian columnist | • Polly Toynbee is a Guardian columnist |
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